


Hold me. For I am broken, and I need time.

by rednecksaints



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Alexandria Safe-Zone, Beth Greene Lives, F/M, Implied Daryl Dixon/Beth Greene, bethyl
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-26
Updated: 2016-06-26
Packaged: 2018-07-18 06:37:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,609
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7303510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rednecksaints/pseuds/rednecksaints
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>ONE SHOT:</p><p>After Beth manages to escape from Grady Memorial, she's captured by a very different enemy. Rick and the group find her month's later at Negan's compound during the siege. After bringing her back to Alexandria, Beth seeks comfort from the one person that can truly give her what she needs.</p><p>(I found the fan art below on Pinterest, and it's pretty much perfect)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hold me. For I am broken, and I need time.

  
[ ](http://s649.photobucket.com/user/rednecksaints/media/IMG_0356_zpsgrxpsbaa.jpg.html)  


  


They found her at one of Negan’s compounds. 

It wasn’t part of the original plan, but after sieging the building and its residents, Rick and his crew felt a power that left them unstoppable. They took her back because they could, and even if there were ramifications for their actions, at least they’d done something. At least they’d tried.

She was quiet in the car. Glenn held her hand in the backseat and reassured her that everything would be okay. They were taking her home -- taking her back to Maggie -- but she couldn’t think of either of those things. She couldn’t think at all. She’d been held alone in a cell for months. The last conversation she had with another human being revolved around her no longer eating her food. She’d started refusing the minimum amount of nutrition they’d provided for her as a form of protest, and in return, one of Negan’s men shoved a small dinner roll down her throat. She reflexively gagged for days after, and she never wanted to look at bread again. 

None of it felt real. She’d been dreaming of something like this since the day she escaped the hospital, so that had to be it. This had to be another one of her dreams. 

They stopped in front of a gate and Rick honked once. Two men Beth didn’t recognize stepped out from behind the barricade and began reeling it back, allowing the car to drive through. They were in a town. There were actual houses that still looked like they were lived in. There were flowers and gardens and spare parts of tools tossed about within them that made this place look like it was used. Like it thrived. It was much different than the prison. Much different than the hospital and the cage she’d most recently learned to call home. 

Much different than the funeral home. 

She heard a lot of voices after that. It was too loud for her to properly process it all, but she could tell that the people fawning over her were happy to see her. There were tears of joy and shrieks of astonishment. 

_“She made it,”_ they cried under catching their breath.  
_“She’s actually alive.”_

_“But is she okay?”_  
_“She must be messed up now, right?”_

Maggie’s voice was the softest, but it still rang true.  
_“Bethy. You’re here.”_

She couldn’t force a smile. The muscles in her cheeks were numb from lack of use, and it just felt odd to want to do it. It felt inappropriate and unnatural now that she had a choice. 

Deanna set her up on the couch at Maggie and Glenn’s house. They gave her pillows and blankets and a cold glass of water to keep next to her if she needed it. Maggie offered to share the space with her, but Beth declined with a small shake of her head. She needed to be alone. As grateful as she was to be there, she needed to fall back into a sense of rhythm before she could embrace the onslaught of change. It had been terrifying trapped in that cell for so long with just her thoughts, but right now… that was what she desperately craved. All of the chaos of being reunited with her family -- it was too much to swallow just yet. 

She watched the clock over the fireplace tick by seconds into minutes. Then hours.  
It was 2 AM, and she’d yet to close her eyes. 

She stood up, walking carefully to the kitchen to look out the window. Her sister’s new home was nice. It overlooked a vegetable garden -- one Beth assumed Maggie had started herself with a little inspiration from Hershel’s memory -- and it gave off a sense of security she hadn’t felt in a long time. Not since the early days of finding the prison. Finding that place had made Beth feel confident. It made her feel hope. 

Hope was lost now. 

She decided to take a walk outside. It was late fall, so the nights were cool and dry. She didn’t have shoes, but the asphalt felt good on her bare skin. The T-shirt Glenn had lent her was loose and soft, so she clung to it, wrapping her arms around herself to fight against the chill in the wind. There wasn’t a plan. Her steps guided her down the street until she reached a bend in the circle and chose to turn around. She was just going to keep doing that until she started to feel tired, but then she saw it. 

It was a bike. 

She assumed it was _his_ bike -- not the same bike that had belonged to Merle, but one that clearly screamed its allegiance to the creator. _Him._ She knew he was there. The others had whispered his name when she first arrived. 

_“We should tell Daryl.”_  
_“No. Wait till morning. She should rest.”_

His house looked darker than the others. Small shimmers of light faded in the windows of his neighbors, but not this house. Everything was dark. Quiet. 

She ascended the steps of the porch and stood at the door without thinking. She turned the handle without considering what to do next, and then she was inside. Feeling her way along the room, she let her fingers fall over the back of a couch. They found a table. A book. She squeezed her eyes shut then opened them again, trying to force her pupils to dilate. Force them to focus on where she was. 

Slowly, the outline of the room around her became clearer. She wanted to call out for him, but she couldn’t say his name. She couldn’t say anything, so instead she kept wandering. Into the kitchen and past the hall that led to a bedroom. But he wasn’t there. He was gone.

She stood, watching the sheets all crumbled and clearly slept in, and waited to see if they would move, but they didn’t. They remained motionless, and it flooded her without disappointment. She needed proof that the things she was touching were really his. She just needed to know that even after she was taken, he’d kept on living. 

When she made her way back to the front door, she felt something crush her. It wasn’t disappointment or even sadness. It was a tinge of guilt. Why was he expected to do anything for her? It wasn’t his job to pick up her pieces now that she was back, even though she desperately wanted him to be able to. 

She fell to the ground suddenly. It wasn’t graceful. Her knees gave out beneath her, and before she could realize it, she was no longer standing. And she was crying. It confused her, because she hadn’t cried in months. For a while, within the first few days she was taken by Negan’s men, she only allowed herself the relief when they thought she was asleep. But that was only temporary. That was before visitors started intruding in her cell every other night and taking advantage of her. Taking everything.

A rush of emotions hit her like a freight train. She’d never felt more lost or more scared. She felt alone, despite being surrounded by a town full of people. She felt hurt. She felt abandoned. She felt crushed and swallowed whole. She felt the fresh cuts on her knees and the bruise that would soon form on her arm where it hit the frame of the door. 

And then she felt his hands. 

She tried not to soak in the feeling completely, because she was too scared of it disappearing. She didn’t want it to just be another one of her dreams. Her silly, stupid dreams. But when she opened her eyes, he was really there. 

He’d heard her. Somehow, he knew she was there and he wasn’t surprised. Not shocked to see her in his house and even less to see her in front of him. Alive. Of course he knew. He’d just been keeping his distance. He’d been giving her time and space, because he knew she needed it. Because he knew she’d find him when she was ready. He crouched in front of her and scooped her into an embrace, lifting her to rest against his chest. There was something there. Some small bit of crushing relief that casted a shadow briefly over his face and then disappeared. He held her small frame in his lap and she curled into him. She _cried_ into him, burying her face in the crook of his neck and taking in all that was him. Cigarette smoke and sweat. He smelled like home.

Neither of them said anything. There would be plenty of time to tell him what happened to her. Of course he’d want to know, but it didn’t have to be right now. They didn’t speak because they didn’t need to. They just needed to be there. To hold each other. To be okay. Daryl rested his back against the wall and pulled her closer. He wasn’t going to let her go. Not this time. Not ever.

This was what she’d wanted. Not to be bombarded by everyone’s tearful greetings and suffocating hugs. She just wanted to be quiet. She just wanted to sit in the dark and be still. To not be smothered, but merely held. 

He did that for her. He did everything right by her, and she didn’t let it go unnoticed. Not anymore. Things were going to be different now. Things were going to change, and that was okay, because when they did… he would be there. 

He would be here. Holding her, just like this.


End file.
